Hospital Thrift Store Makes $200,000 this Year to Help Fund Medical Supplies

The thrift store, New To You, run by volunteers of the Royal Columbian Hospital Auxilliary provides considerable funds that pay for many needed medical items in the hospital. This year the funds amounted to more than $200,000. Once a year, once the hospital departments have created their budgets for the year, they put together a wish list of their needs, items that might be covered by the RCH Auxilliary. Representatives of each department come to a meeting of the RCH Auxilliary and the RCH foundations to make presentations about the items that they would like to be funded. This year, 51 items were funded for use in a variety of departments. These items ranged from infant sleep sack to surgical instruments, from a biopsy device to an infinity game table for ACL patients, and a whole lot more. Funded were the wish lists of 14 departments including medical imaging, hematology, speech language pathology, respiratory therapy and others. Thrift store volunteer Deni Loubert talks about the store, it's mission and the recent presentation event, which she videotaped.